dual sport ride fuel milage

Weather warmed to 70/75F degrees, though I would ride my 010 570 as a dual sport
Bike worked absolutely great and the fuel mileage was incredible with some self control of the throttle
I'm been running 14/50 sprockets, desert riding, this winter since the bike was new in late December
I run a Rekluse clutch with a LHRB
Balanced wheels and tires
Terrain was desert and mountains, two track dirt and sand roads, cow trailing, opened areas with sage brush and pavement miles totaled 50 miles from house and back. Total ride mileage was 268 miles!!
Best mileage, gassed up at Montello, NV. at 126 miles took exactly TWO gals. over sixty miles per gallon. Very happy with this mileage. I was being very steady and easy with the throttle only throttled the bike hard about six times just for the excitement!
Took a different route back to Idaho with more dirt and some sand washes but tried to be easy on the throttle, my returning mileage was 53 mpg because of a few sand washes, just had to ride them, but the mileage was still great.
This winter (cold will use a little more fuel) I was getting about 30mpg running the bike hard in washes and single track.
After the 268 mile ride I can say the seat is not bad for me( but I'm small) the bike is very smooth, it will cruise at 60/65mph (pavement) with very little throttle opening and it's as smooth as any single cylinder dual sport I've ridden. The bike will rip up to 90mph very quickly and easy. Most of the two track road speeds were 30 to 70 mph
The bike is a blast, whether riding hard in the desert trails and washes or riding from the house to the desert and mountains. Yes I do carry gas, my 70* racing sub-frame tank is on order. I check oil temp twice, both times 188*F perfect. I use a digital liquid temp tester. I've been running my ign map on std. setting coolant does not heat up as much at slow speeds hard going as the advanced curve. Dual sport riding with good air flow the advanced ign.mapping would probably work O-K
Have a great ride
Haskell in Idaho

Thanks for the info.

I have wondered what the bike could do under best conditions, I just never had the patience to find out. Not that I race the bike at all, but I do ride single track, and the pavement I ride to get there involves dodging in and out of traffic so none of it is just steady riding at a given speed. That and I run 12/52 gearing. So I always get in the low thirties.

08 550 with nobbies, i ride 74 miles round trip 7 days on 7 off ocasional wheelies and varying rpms. And I get 52mpg every ride. Jetting stock, for now.

very good information,thank you. can anyone tell me what the typical mileage is for a 09 fe 450?

I am agree with you that dual sport gives the best performance. It is perfect for the long journey. But I am worried about its mileage. Have you any idea how to keep better mileage?

It is perfect for the long journey. But I am worried about its mileage. Have you any idea how to keep better mileage?

For goodness sakes...........
With a wedge shaped 4x2 for a seat they aint ever gona be good let alone perfickt for the long journey.
If youre worried about its milage dont use it..... wont clock any up then.
If you want better gas milage then dont open the throttle so far........
And if you were to give some indication as to the type and size of your (assuming itsa Berg as you are on this site) bike it may help to get a little more helpful reply.
The gearing, tyre size and type and your riding style all affect consumption.
There are some real knowledgeable and helpful people on this site but not one of them can read minds.
over to you bro.

bergbite said:

very good information,thank you. can anyone tell me what the typical mileage is for a 09 fe 450?

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From what I have read, they get about 10% better mileage than a 570 - so for my kind of riding that would be mid to upper 30s.

From memory (not very good) you have lowered your gearing codebro! More revs at the same roadspeed must = more fuel used.
Any idea wot the consumption is with stock gearing?
Mid 30's seems like a high rate of fuel use for a single cylinder which you dont ride hard (again relying on the seive between my ears) but as your not the only one claiming 30's then maybe thats normal. My 650 returns between 45-50mpg but itrs geared to the moon and used on backroads.

BERGBRO said:

From memory (not very good) you have lowered your gearing codebro! More revs at the same roadspeed must = more fuel used.
Any idea wot the consumption is with stock gearing?
Mid 30's seems like a high rate of fuel use for a single cylinder which you dont ride hard (again relying on the seive between my ears) but as your not the only one claiming 30's then maybe thats normal. My 650 returns between 45-50mpg but itrs geared to the moon and used on backroads.

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I got about the same consumption (low 30s) when I had stock gearing, but then the bike was breaking in. I personally don't pay too much attention to consumption lately except to worry about range and running out of fuel. One of the problems is that the fuel tank, mine at least, seems to have bubbles in it that prevent it from being fully filled - when I fill it up, then ride just three miles the level has gone down more than it should IMO. I think that is due to the fuel settling in the tank and the bubbles being purged.

I have read that most people get low 30s with their 570s - and yes, that is a bit much, especially with EFI and single. I got as high as 65 with my DR350, more typically 55 MPG after a pipe and rejet, but it could still get 65 MPG in some situations. The worst I ever got was 35 MPG riding against a headwind up hill wide open.

I can't speak to why the 570 doesn't get quite the mileage it should, but from what I have read I am not alone.

Seems like I just commented on this in another thread....................

I get low 30's riding/racing desert with a 13/50 combo, at 4400' of elevation. This compares well with my 04 550 which got about 32 mpg in the same conditions.

Strictly dual sport riding I have gotten 38 mpg.

At high elevation say 8500' on up riding single track with smooth throttle operation, I get as high as 42 to 45. As stated above the mpg is highly dependent on your throttle hand and conditions.

You may or may not realize that this, there is an enrichment feature that is in the fuel map, that simulates an accelerator pump. This is one of the area's that you can adjust with the user setting tool. So one thing you can do to help fuel mileage is to try to keep your right wrist from constantly opening and closing the throttle. I rest my had on my hand guard and just use the first two fingers and thumb to hold the throttle steady.

So at the end of the day for me at least, I have my 09 FI bike that runs the same all the time, no matter what, throttle response and power are always consistent, and it get's a little less mpg, that's some thing I can deal with. Even if it meant carry extra fuel in a pack for a long ride. On the other hand, I had my 550 which I got as high as 52 mpg out of, but as with all carbed bikes it ran differently all the time, AND, I had to re jet it when I went from my desert riding area to my mountain area. All I have to do now is to let the bike idle for 15 minutes and the bike jets itself, how cool is that?

Codemonkey, when you top your bike off, do it on a center stand, fill it all the way up, put on the cap, and rock the bike front to back a few times and remove the cap and you will see that you have burped the air pocket out that is located where the cross over tube is for the sub frame truss. Remember too that the tank really wedding cakes towards the top and is visually deceiving.

Sub frame fuel tank production is at 14 units per day starting Monday, so get your orders in and quit worrying about mpg and just ride!! At the minimum you should be able to get 90 miles out of a 570 at 30mpg.

DaleEO said:

Codemonkey, when you top your bike off, do it on a center stand, fill it all the way up, put on the cap, and rock the bike front to back a few times and remove the cap and you will see that you have burped the air pocket out that is located where the cross over tube is for the sub frame truss. Remember too that the tank really wedding cakes towards the top and is visually deceiving.

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I fill the tank at the gas station with myself on the bike so it is upright. I then rock the bike back and forth - I know the drill, I do it with my Ducati.

Sub frame fuel tank production is at 14 units per day starting Monday, so get your orders in and quit worrying about mpg and just ride!! At the minimum you should be able to get 90 miles out of a 570 at 30mpg.

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I am working on getting a job so I don't have to dig into my savings to be able to buy tanks and other farkles - until then I keep those expenditures to a minimum.

G'day,

Im Aussie so we don't use gallons, or milage.

I own a 09' Berg 570 with 11200klms on the engine or 220+hrs.

I am interested in this fuel consumption business as I have never really cared about mine until now. You guys state that at worst state scenario I can get 90 miles on a standard tank. How many klms is that, about 150?.

I recently finished a 6 day ride to Cape Flattery from Cairns, QLD, Aust and had no drama's with fuel consumption. I was riding with a band of 7 motley riders with manely DRZ400's with standard tanks up front and a 5 litre reserve tank strapped to the rear fender. I was riding with Roy from Cape York Motorcycle Adventures, as such, he was on his 08' KTM 530 with an 16L aftermarket safari tank.

My Berg was brilliant. I only needed to top up from my 5 reserve once, on the fartherest stretch, which was amazing considering some of the DRZ's were running out. I did excercise throttle control on the beach though.

We covered about 850klms over the six days, however, the stretch from cooktown to Cape Flattery was much longer than the previous days ride stops between servo's (probably about 200klms). I dont know exactly how much longer we rode but I was stretching my fuel and eventually ran out, and topped up with my reserve that Roy loaned me for the ride. And I was on my way home too, when I ran out. Roy and I were predicting that my berg would have ran out of fuel some time before we arrived at our destination and would need the reserves then. The 570 proved to be a miser compared to the two KTM 530's.

My question is: what is the expected klm i can actually achieve on the standard 8.5L - berg 570 09' 13/53 gearing std tyre size and knobbies. Tropical climate.

Doesn't answer your question directly as the circumstances are different, but to give you an idea: 2010 FE450, knobbies, standard gearing, 40% road 60% trails, riding gently due to slow riders in the group and I'm still restricted to 75% throttle, warm dry UK conditions (28C), standard ignition map, it did 52 miles on 4.2L, which if my calculations where right is just over 100 miles on a tank, i.e. about 160km.

Next time out we did the same trip at a faster pace (no slow riders in the group) on only 3.5L so either the engine is still freeing up or it prefers to go faster! That would mean something like 120 miles or 190km on a tank. I certainly wouldn't rely on getting that much as it seems to be more than most people report and it may vary, but so far it's better than I was expecting (it used less fuel than any of the other bikes in the group, though most of them were quite old bikes with carbs).

Your 570 will presumably use a little more juice than the 450?

I always see great fuel millage numbers being posted here and other locations.My experience with my 390 off road taking it very easy for the purpose of getting fuel range readings my reserve light comes on at 40-45 miles.Somewhat disappointing as I need turn around and head back to the truck after 20-25 miles. I know the sub tank will help but that's still an issue for me,60 or 65 would be expected or am I overly optimistic?What are some of your off road mpg's?